


Cryptid

by WaitingForMy



Category: IT (2017), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Agender!Pennywise, Female!Reader - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-20
Updated: 2017-12-20
Packaged: 2019-02-17 18:10:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13082433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WaitingForMy/pseuds/WaitingForMy
Summary: You are one of America's finest cryptid researchers, and your team has finally captured the infamous "It."





	1. You

**Author's Note:**

> I'm considering adding to this, depending on the reaction it gets. Let me know what you think!

Your nervousness and excitement was palpable. They had finally found it.

_ It. _ The thing your team had been searching for for ages, since long before you were born. The thing your father was so obsessed with, he left his wife and only child to find it, only to die of mysterious circumstances.

You never blamed your father. It was your mother who had given the ultimatums, filed for divorce, and separated you from him. It was your mother who had cut you off when you revealed your chosen path, and it was your mother who reconnected with you a year later, sobbing and begging you not to do it.

But you didn’t have a choice, did you? You were just a little girl, when you lost your father. You didn’t understand what was happening or know what to do. And then a red balloon floated in through your open window.

You never mentioned it to your mother, but you knew that day that you were going to follow in your father’s footsteps and join the search for...whatever it was he was looking for. 

And now, the search was over. They had found it in a little town in Maine called Derry. You got the call at half past three in the morning. You packed and left Washington D.C. within the hour.

You didn’t know much. Hell,  _ nobody _ knew much about this thing. You knew that one of your teammates - one whom you didn’t know very well - was in critical condition after the capture. You knew they were in the process of transporting the creature to the lab in Manhattan. You were set to arrive at about the same time as them.

The drive was long and dark and slow, but adrenaline was coursing through your veins. In your almost ten years as a cryptid researcher, you had uncovered a number of Bigfoot hoaxes and caught unprecedented video of the Jersey Devil, but nothing could compare to this. This - this creature -  _ It _ \- is why you got into the field.

Doing your best to avoid rush hour traffic, it still took you around six hours to reach your destination. Your team’s lab in Manhattan was small, but functional. You found one of your teammates waiting outside, smoking a cigarette.

“James!” you called out to him, jogging from your car.

James was one of your good friends from the capture team. He was normally a soft looking man, with chestnut brown hair and a well trimmed beard. Today, he was white as a sheet and practically buzzing. His warm brown eyes were wide and bloodshot.

He took a long drag off his cigarette. “We caught it by surprise, [YN]. We got it, but…” He shook his head, looking past you. “I’ve never seen anything like it, [YN]. I just got word that Johnny died in the hospital in Maine. Be careful.”

You nodded solemnly and walked inside. The edgy atmosphere was much the same in there, with the rest of the capture team and the lab’s manager standing around in silence. You grabbed a lab coat and a stethoscope off a hook on the wall.

“Is it sedated?” you asked.

Tanner, another member of the capture team, nodded. “It’s high as a kite, and we’ve implanted a chip in its brain to keep it from shifting.”

“Someone should go in there with you,” Beth, the lab manager, said.

You shook your head, earning a surprised look from your colleagues. “Watch through the window,” you qualified. “I don’t want to overwhelm it.”

Tanner scoffed. “S’gonna take a lot to overwhelm it.”

You walked over to the door to the hallway, but hesitated as your hand brushed the handle. You turned back to the others. “What shape is it in?”

“A clown,” several members of the capture team answered in unison.

_ Of course. _

You never were fond of clowns.

You and your team all walked into the hallway and made your way down to room 17. Inside, much like an operating room, there was a small space with a window looking into the lab. That’s where the others would stay while you examined the creature.

Through the window, you saw it for the first time. It was seated and restrained in a operating chair.  _ Much like one you might sit in at the dentist, _ you mused.

It looked like something that crawled straight out of your nightmares - humanoid, but exceptionally tall, wearing a dingy, bloodstained clown costume. Its face appeared to be caked with white and red makeup, though you were sure the coloration was a part of its current form and not actually makeup. It had fiery red hair, some of which stuck out from his head in an almost comically clown-like fashion, some of which was damp against his face with sweat. The most striking thing about its appearance, however, was it’s glowing eyes, shifting nervously around the room.

“If anything happens,” you mumbled to your team, mesmerized, “secure the area and get yourselves to safety. Don’t worry about me.”

The others minutely nodded, their eyes trained on your face. You all knew the risks involved in this operation. You were not afraid to die.

You grabbed its chart off the table beneath the window and walked through the airlock, into the room with It.


	2. It

It’s golden eyes turned red when they saw you. It began snarling and thrashing against its restraints. You knew it had been weakened by both the sedation and the chip in its brain that kept this shapeshifter from shifting. Oh, how the tables had turned on this creature that fed on fear…

“Don’t be scared,” you told it. “I’m not here to hurt you.”

You pulled a chair over from the corner of the room, close but just far enough so that it couldn’t reach you if it managed to get an arm free. It watched you all the while with feral eyes, and you felt a tightness in your chest, as if a strong hand was gripping your heart.

“I’m Doctor [YN] [LN]. I’m a cryptid researcher. I’ve been waiting my whole life to meet you.”

Its eyes trained on you, glowing blood red. It creature was breathing heavily and...trembling?

“What’s your name?” you asked.

“Pennywise,” it said, its voice a raspy whisper. “Pennywise the _Dan-_ cing Clown.”

“In this form. But what’s your real name?”

Its upper lip curled into a sneer of disgust, and its voice slipped into a demonic growl. “Names are human.”

Again, that tightness pulsed in your chest. You took a deep breath to dissipate it and glanced at the chart in your hands.

 

_Name: It_

_Species: Shapeshifter_

_Sex:_

_Birth Date:_

 

You clicked the pen in your hand.

 

 _Name:_ ~~_It_ ~~ _Pennywise_

 

“How old are you, Pennywise?”

It didn’t answer, it just stared at the juncture of the wall and the floor, its hands gripping and releasing the arms of the chair like a cat kneading. Its eyes faded to a baby blue color as moisture collected in the corners. You were stunned. Was it...crying?

A sharp knock on the window made you jump, and you turned to see your colleagues beckoning you out. You took one last look at the creature, then joined them in the observation room.

“It’s tricking you,” a member of the capture team warned. “Don’t let it make you feel sympathy.”

You turned and looked at the creature through the window, still staring and kneading.

“Don’t worry,” you mumbled. “I know what I’m doing.”

You marched back into the room with the creature and scooted your chair closer to it. You took your stethoscope off your shoulders.

“I’d like to take your vital signs, Pennywise. May I touch you?”

The creature looked surprised, clearly not expecting to be shown such courtesies as bodily autonomy. Truth be told, it wasn’t part of your team’s protocol, but you were compelled to show this creature compassion. Perhaps it had to do with your father.

You showed it the end of your stethoscope. “I’m going to put this on your chest. It might be cold, but nothing I do to you should feel invasive or painful, okay?”

Lacking a verbal answer, you moved slowly and watched the creature’s reaction carefully as you pressed the stethoscope to its skin through a tear in its tattered clothes.

“Take a deep breath for me.”

Much to your surprise, it complied.

What you heard through your stethoscope sounded distinctly human, much to your surprise, interest, and borderline delight.

“Do your internal organs shift with you?”

You were done expecting answers from the creature.

“I’m going to listen to your stomach,” you said, moving the stethoscope downwards.

 _That_ got a reaction.

The creature’s eyes flashed red and it jerked towards you, gnashing its teeth.

Its _teeth_. You hadn’t seen them before. There were rows upon rows of them, like a shark.

After your initial jump at the creature’s outburst, you did your best to remain calm and impassive.

“Okay,” you said evenly. “I won’t touch your stomach.”

That reaction was interesting, though. Very interesting.

You glanced down at the chart.

 

_Sex:_

 

“Pennywise, are you a male or a female?”

It sneered, like it had before telling you that _names are human._

“Human,” you sighed. “Got it. Then answer me this; are you pregnant, Pennywise?”

The way its breath caught in its throat was all the answer you needed.

You sighed again, heavier this time. You tossed the clipboard onto the floor to your side. It was time to talk to it, creature to creature.

“Pennywise, I think you killed my father,” you began. You told it your father’s name and described his appearance. The creature was watching you now with rapt attention, though you saw no spark of recognition in those eyes, which had faded back to an orangey gold color.

“I’m not sure why, because he liked you. He never did call you ‘it.’”

The creature cocked its head. “What did he call me?”

You shrugged. “‘He,’ ‘she,’ ‘them.’”

The way its eyes softened then caused that strange tightness in your chest to return with a vengeance. You realized what it was. It was _sadness._ Seeing this powerful, ancient creature reduced to such helplessness made you sad.

You were sure your father had something to do with it. He hadn’t talked to you much about “the shapeshifter” he was so avidly searching for. In fact all you knew of it - _them_ \- was from whispered arguments with your mother when you were supposed to be asleep. However, he used to say something about all the other cryptids that stuck with you, even though you hadn’t heard it since you were four or five.

“We’re all just animals trying to survive,” he used to say.

Your mother wanted you to fear, because she wanted your fear to protect you. Your father never wanted you to fear the things he studied. He wanted you to feel the same awe and affection for them as he did. He succeeded.

You glanced over at your colleagues through the window. You could see the disgust in their eyes, and you understood. This thing ate children. You wondered how many of your colleagues ate lamb or veal or caviar. Those were children, just children of another species.

You continued your examination, working carefully around the creature’s - _Pennywise’s_ \- stomach. You had to hand it to him (You decided on “him,” since he was in a male form), he had near perfectly approximated the human form. He displayed all the normal human reflexes. Even the pupils in his golden eyes expanded and contracted when you shone a light in them. You couldn’t help but smile. This was no Bigfoot or Jersey Devil. This was a highly sophisticated being.

And then your smile faded, because this was a highly sophisticated being.

“I’m all done,” you told him, when you finished your examination. “I can loosen your restraints to make you more comfortable, but I can’t let you out.”

It was standard procedure, but never before had the angry, bloody marks around your patient’s wrists made you want to cry.

As you stood up to walk away, the creature spoke up behind you.

“Are you going to kill me?”

You froze.

Yes, that was the intention. You had always been able to distance yourself from it, but the written protocol for truly dangerous cryptids was to euthanize them by lethal injection. _Same as any dangerous animal,_ you always told yourself. But you were having a hard time seeing Pennywise as an animal, any more than you saw yourself as one. But, of course, you both were.

You turned around with tears in your eyes. “We’re all just animals trying to survive,” you said.

You saw a spark of recognition. Pennywise _had_ met your father.

It hurt worse than you care to remember to leave him...God, to leave him and his unborn offspring...in that room.

 

* * *

 

You insisted on being on the night watch, that night, despite protests from your teammates that you “had done enough.”

“That thing met my father, before he died,” you said. “I want to be here. I _have_ to be here.”

It was only a convenient excuse, of course.

Once they finally agreed to put you on the night watch, it was all a matter of getting your partner, Jake, to fall asleep.

“I’ll wake you up, if anything happens,” you promised. A promise you fully intended to break.

Having been on the capture team, Jake was exhausted, and eventually took you up on your offer. That’s when you returned to the room where Pennywise was still strapped down to the chair.

You didn’t say anything, just walked in and began undoing his restraints. He looked at you questioningly.

“We’re going to kill you,” you explained, “and I don’t think you deserve to die. However…”

You swallowed hard. This was the price you had to pay.

“You have to kill me. If they find out I let you go, I’ll spend the rest of my life rotting in a prison cell. Kill me, escape quietly, and it’ll all be an accident.”

With the final restraint undone, the creature stood up, towering over you. His golden eyes had faded to a clear blue.

“Doctor [YN] [LN],” he said in a sing-song voice, a childlike smile spreading across his face. “I didn’t kill your father.”

He ran a gloved hand through your hair gently, almost affectionately.

“And I’m not going to kill _yoouuu_. Oh nooo.”

He placed his hand on your shoulder and ran it all the way down your arm, while you watched him in awe. You let him go. He was free. Your partner was asleep. He should have killed you and been gone. Instead, he took your hand.


End file.
